From £0 to £154K and back again

purplevamp

Hello :hello: Long time lurker, first time poster

I have been waiting sooooo long to post on the MFW board and today I can :j. Apologies in advance if this post gets too long.

After 15 months of faffing around we have finally bought our house. We got the call today to say the money had gone through.

A bit of background:

We're buying our SH house, which we've lived in for 11 years, we were the first people to live in it too!! We've decided to buy this house rather than a private house because we cannot afford any other house in our town :eek: We're planning on living here for at least 5 years to avoid paying back the discount, and we have to give first refusal to the HA. And it gets us on the ladder.

There's 5 of us living here, me, DH, DS1, DS2 and DD. Five years is a good amount of time as DS2 and DD would have finished school by then and we do love the area. DS1 is working and should have moved out by then :cool::rotfl:

The mortgage is with Santander and we've borrowed a massive £154K :eek::eek: This is over 24 and a half years and is on a 2 year fixed at 1.9%.

Now, just because it's for 25 years doesn't mean I want to have it that long. My plan is to get shot of it as fast as possible, as going from no debt to that much is a bit scary. We're allowed to OP by 10% of the outstanding balance, (very unlikely every year) and OP's have to be at least £500.

Essay over for now. Hope to speak to you all soon, you have all been such an inspiration and I've been itching to join in for years.

Mrs_Rachel_Trelfa

Hi purplevamp,

Welcome to the mfw gang. Congratulations on buying your house. I will follow with interest but but not the financial interest....ok bad joke..going back to my cuppa

CathT

Hi purplevamp, congratulations and welcome. That's a pretty good fixed rate. Do you have any targets for the first coupleof years? The spreadsheets and overpayment calculators are really motivating. I shall follow your journey, good luck.

mumto2monkeys_2

Will be following - we owe a similar amount to you and are just beginning this journey.

purplevamp

Thanks for the replies everyone, I feel like I know you all as I've stalked these boards for years

The rate only got that low as our first offer ran out and we had to reapply, which has worked out well for us. The LTV is just under 75%.

My plans (in my head) are to OP as much as possible in the first 2 years, which is easier said than done, as I've gone from f/t to p/t and I don't see this changing any time soon. Being f/t was seriously affecting my health, I had 3 months off in November. I'm a lot happier and healthier because of it. This has only impacted my wages by around £200 per month.

We initially wanted to convert the attic into a bedroom or two but as we had to put more deposit down this is unlikely. We still have £10K left for emergencies :T.

I want to extend the kitchen and sort out the [STRIKE]giant hill[/STRIKE] garden. Again this is an expensive plan.

As the first payment hasn't even come out yet I think I'll just concentrate on getting to my first £500 OP.

I do the usual things, Tilly tidies (told you I was a stalker ), surveys, comps, etc. I also have a very lovely and large piggy bank called Kevin. Every day my spare change goes into him and I don't miss it. I've had him just over a year and he's nowhere near full.

ourcornercottage

Welcome! We have similarish amount and are trying to get paid off in 10 years to be MF.

Will read with interest :-)

purplevamp

It's been nearly a month since I first posted but nothing has happened so therefore no posts!!

My first payment came out today (well Saturday technically). It was £40 less than it normally will be so I've put the extra £40 into my overpayment account. :j Is it weird that I'm excited about paying a mortgage??!

That was a little bit short lived as I then worked out that the interest was £209.48 :eek::eek: Now if that's not an incentive to overpay then I don't know what is.

I've been busy doing surveys and saving to get to my first £500, only about £30 away so it shouldn't be long. I may move some money over just to get it there .

I've applied for a new job as my current ones are not doing it for me anymore. And I don't feel valued like I used to, partly because our department (job no. 1) is slowly dissolving and my manager is slowing deserting us. And also because at a meeting to discuss my reduced hours, or so I thought, my manager really laid into me about how I got my own way with cutting my hours, and that my travel to and from work was my problem, why don't I hand in my notice or they'll sack me. This left me feeling really bad and I did cry

Anyway, back to trying to pay off the mortgage. I need to start ebaying again soon as the house is riddled in unwanted [STRIKE]crap[/STRIKE] items which I know could make a few pennies.

Speak to you all soon xx

Luckyinlife

Hehe welcome on board im new as well last month or so

I was also excited about the first payment but im onto the second now and not so excited haha

good luck

Mrs_Rachel_Trelfa

I think we all get excited for the first mortgage payment. If it makes you feel better I get excited for pay day. Not because I get money to spend, but because it's money to overpay the mortgage.

purplevamp

Made my first OP today of £500 :j. Can't wait to see it come off my total. I thought it would be automatic. I asked for it to come off the capital but to keep the payments the same. Maybe it'll show tomorrow.

Luckyinlife

Well done :] Great overpayment